PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Oregon’s wildfire season is picking up just as much of the state prepares for triple-digit heat.

A fire west of Sunriver led officials to warn people in a subdivision they might have to evacuate. The same situation played out in the southern Oregon town of Paisley, where an 800-acre blaze was one of four that started Wednesday afternoon in Lake County.

In Eastern Oregon, crews set intentional blazes to rob the Rail fire of fuel as it burns about 10 miles southwest of Unity. The wildfire that has scorched 37 square miles produced a large column of smoke that could be seen from Baker City.

Firefighters won’t have comfortable conditions to battle the flames. The forecast for Thursday and Friday calls for temperatures near or above 100 in Western Oregon and it’ll be in the 90s east of the Cascades.

The fire near Sunriver was relatively small, less than a square mile, but its location near the resort community got attention.

Crews worked through the night and continued to focus on the southeast corner, the direction the fire had been moving and an area with homes, said Patrick Lair, spokesman for Central Oregon Interagency Dispatch Center. Crews got a line around the fire at about 2:30 a.m. Thursday and did back-burning through the night. About 250 people continued to fight the blaze.

The fire northwest of Paisley was moving toward private and Fremont-Winema National Forest lands. The evacuation notice means residents in town of about 250 people should monitor the news and be ready to potentially leave home.

The other fires in Lake County, which borders California and Nevada, were small and posed no threat.

BEND, Ore. (AP) — An environmental group is suing the U.S. Forest Service over its plan to thin trees in an Oregon forest.

The Bulletin reports that the nonprofit League of Wilderness Defenders filed a lawsuit in federal court Monday arguing the Forest Service illegally avoided an environmental review of its thinning plan.

The agency in December 2015 approved the Walton Lake Restoration Project, which calls for thinning, replanting and other work on about 176 acres near the lake in Ochoco National Forest.

According to the project, some of the conifer trees around the lake have a root disease that could call the tree to fall, even though it might look healthy. The agency says the process has environmental benefits but could pose a safety risk to people.

BEND, Ore. (AP) — More advocacy groups have filed lawsuits seeking injunctions to stop researchers from surgically sterilizing more than 200 wild mares in Central Oregon.

The Bulletin reports the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign and The Cloud Foundation jointly filed a lawsuit on Monday against the Bureau of Land Management arguing that the agency had violated the groups’ First Amendment rights by rejecting their request to record the procedures.

Bureau officials say they are still reviewing the latest lawsuits.

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has said the research in Hines, Oregon, would help determine whether the three methods to be studied could be safely used to control the wild horse population.

Front Range Equine Rescue and Friends of Animals have also sued the agency over the proposed sterilization.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Oregon’s wildfire season is picking up right as much of the state prepares for triple-digit heat.

A fire burning west of Sunriver led officials to warn people in a subdivision they might have to evacuate. The same situation is playing out in the southern Oregon town of Paisley, where an 800-acre blaze is one of four that started Wednesday afternoon in Lake County.

In Eastern Oregon, crews set intentional blazes to rob the Rail fire of fuel as it burns about 10 miles southwest of Unity. The wildfire that has scorched 37 square miles produced a large column of smoke that could be seen from Baker City.

Firefighters won’t have comfortable conditions to battle the flames. The forecast for Thursday and Friday calls for temperatures near or above 100 in Western Oregon and it’ll be in the 90s east of the Cascades.

ALBANY, Ore. — Linn County shouldn’t be allowed to represent other counties in a lawsuit seeking $1.4 billion from Oregon over its forest management practices, according to the state’s attorneys.

It’s also impractical for the case to proceed as a class action due to the different forest circumstances in each county, the state’s attorneys claimed during oral arguments Aug. 17 in Albany, Ore.

The county filed a lawsuit against the State of Oregon earlier this year, arguing that insufficient logging had cost 15 counties more than $1.4 billion.

The complaint claims these counties turned over ownership of forestlands to Oregon in the early 20th Century with the expectation the state would maximize timber revenues, but since 1998, forest managers have instead prioritized wildlife habitat, water quality and recreation values.

More than 650,000 acres were donated to Oregon by Benton, Clackamas, Clatsop, Columbia, Coos, Douglas, Josephine, Klamath, Lane, Lincoln, Linn, Marion, Polk, Tillamook, and Washington counties.

Linn County is seeking class action status for the lawsuit, permitting it to represent the other counties in the case.

Scott Kaplan, an attorney for Oregon, said the problems in managing the case as a class action would be “enormous.”

The counties donated 183 separate parcels of land to the state, each of which contains different slopes, tree types, waterways and federally- protected species, he said.

Determining how much timber could have been generated from each parcel would devolve into 183 mini-trials, he said.

“How can we decide if revenue has been maximized on a particular parcel unless you consider all of those issues?” Kaplan said.

Linn County is also an inadequate representative of the other counties for multiple reasons, he said.

The litigation costs are currently being paid for by timber groups and lumber companies — Oregon Forest & Industries Council, Sustainable Forests Fund, Stimson Lumber and Hampton Tree Farms.

Linn County is simply lending its name to a lawsuit that actually represents private interests, according to Oregon’s attorneys.

“It’s not a public interest case. It’s a case to benefit one particular group,” said Kaplan.

Unlike the counties, which appreciate tourism and other benefits from uses besides logging, the timber interests funding the lawsuit primarily want to change the state’s “greatest permanent value” rules for forest management to emphasize harvesting, he said.

Much of the alleged damages are for lost future timber revenues, which may force the state to change its logging policies, he said.

“That would directly challenge the interests of the other counties,” Kaplan said.

The case also doesn’t qualify as a class action because of the lack of “commonality” among the counties, which donated their land to Oregon during different times and under specific terms, he said.

The presence of threatened and endangered species, which constrain logging, varies widely by county and affects the damages calculation, he said.

“It’s a complicated issue involving federal agencies,” Kaplan said.

Chris McCracken, an attorney for Linn County, rejected the argument there’s a lack of commonality among the counties.

They all face the same issues, such as whether the state has violated its contract to maximize timber revenues, he said.

“We have common questions in droves,” McCracken said.

The Oregon Department of Forestry does not manage each parcel individually but instead treats them according to regional forest plans, he said.

Deciding the counties’ contractual rights collectively is more efficient than trying separate cases with potentially conflicting verdicts, he said.

McCracken also disputed that the lawsuit’s funding mechanism should disqualify it as a class action.

The Davis Wright Tremaine law firm would be entitled to 15 percent of any financial award in the case.

Contingency fees aren’t unusual in class action lawsuits, particularly since the counties are strapped for cash and could not afford such litigation on their own, McCracken said.

“There are no disabling conflicts between Linn County and the class members,” he said.

It’s irrelevant whether some counties prefer the forests to be managed for ecological or recreational benefits, McCracken said.

The lawsuit’s outcome won’t affect these priorities, he said.

“All that is sought here is money damages,” he said. “This lawsuit is not seeking to change the management of the forests.”

Linn County Circuit Court Judge Daniel Murphy said he would issue a ruling by Sept. 19 on the class certification issue as well as the state’s motions to dismiss.

CORNELIUS, Ore. (AP) — A small fire on an Oregon farmer’s field whipped up several firenados — tornados comprised of flames and smoke.

The smoky twisters cropped up in the field after a piece of farming equipment on Friday sparked the fire, which ultimately burned about 7 acres.

Cornelius Fire Department spokesman Matt Johnston said erratic winds contributed to the flaming phenomenon. He said the fire sucks in oxygen to fuel itself and the heat rises, causing the spinning column of flames and smoke.

Johnston filmed one in an adjacent field that swirled for about two minutes and shot up about 200 feet.

While Oregon has had a tame wildfire season so far, Johnston said three days of expected triple digit heat has crews worried.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — The first defendant in the armed takeover of an Oregon wildlife refuge early this year has been sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison for his role.

The Oregonian/OregonLive reports that Corey Lequieu, 46, was sentenced Tuesday, the first person to be sent to prison in the federal conspiracy case.

U.S. District Judge Anna J. Brown also sentenced Lequieu to three years of supervised release after prison and an amount of restitution to be determined later.

In May, Lequieu was the first of 26 standoff defendants charged with conspiracy to plead guilty. He admitted to impeding federal employees through threats, intimidation or force from working at the refuge outside Burns, Oregon.

The conspiracy charge carries a prison sentence of up to six years. But federal prosecutors recommended less time as part of a plea agreement, at least partly because Lequieu was the first in the case to take responsibility.

BURNS, Ore. — A recent decision by the federal government kept sage grouse off the Endangered Species List, but Harney County ranchers, displeased with the BLM’s range management plan amendment, are considering taking their complaint to court.

Louie Molt, chairman of the Harney County Soil and Water District, said the agency disregarded input from rural communities.

“When they were writing the Range Management Plan Amendment they asked counties and soil and water districts to come up with their own ideas about how to protect sage grouse and keep the rural community viable,” Molt said. “The BLM took our rural alternative and threw it in the trash.”

The county filed a protest, Molt said, and is now considering legal action. Out of a list of 10 or so complaints, Oregon Cattlemen’s Association Chairman John O’Keefe, a rancher in neighboring Lake County, said one of the biggest concerns is conflicting research over stubble height.

“It’s the implementation phase that is being challenged,” O’Keefe said. “There is research that has come out that the seven-inch minimum stubble height requirement has flaws in the science.”

O’Keefe said peer-reviewed research from the University of Nevada, Reno, raises questions about whether sampling bias might affect the estimates of cover needed for ground nesting birds. Daniel Gibson, Erik Blomberg and James Sedinger from the Program in Ecology, Evolution and Conservation Biology analyzed the timing of nest survival surveys to determine required vegetative cover.

“One of the biggest concerns about the Resource Management Plan is they placed a lot of emphasis on habitat assessment including seven-inch stubble height,” O’Keefe said. “If we are going to manage for additional vegetation with additional wildfire, we are concerned where the BLM is going.”

The bias, according to the study, lies when stubble height is measured — at nest failure from predation or its height at predicted hatch date. Based on the study, the measurements taken at predicted hatch date more accurately predicted the influence of grass height on nest survival.

“Gibson showed if you remove the bias from sampling it shows grass height is not related to nest success,” O’Keefe said. “The BLM is over-emphasizing stubble height at the expense of wildfire, and that concerns us. We are worried they will cut permits on a non-existing nesting threat to the detriment of a fire threat and in a lot of these areas the grass matures at or below the seven-inch level,” O’Keefe said.

Fearing negotiations through the protest would fail; Harney County started raising money to launch a lawsuit. Molt said the district set a minimum goal of $50,000 before it would consider going to court; by Aug. 12 the soil and water district had raised $51,000.

“We are certainly willing to go back to the table with them, but we need to have the right people at the table, possibly (Interior) Secretary Jewell. “We’d like to try to collaborate one last time - we collaborated until we are blue in the face and we have nothing to show that works for us,” Molt said. “We will not proceed with filing suit until we give them one last opportunity to come back to the table to give us something we can live with.”

Jerome Rosa, executive director of Oregon Cattlemen’s Association said his organization supports Harney County’s actions and donated $5,000 to the fund.

“Oregon Cattlemen are still trying to negotiate with the BLM on the implementation and on this rule and if we were to sign on to this suit we give up our ability to negotiate on this, but we support our local cattlemen’s group in what they are doing here,” Rosa said.

Molt said now that the original goal has been met the second goal is to raise $100,000 and the far, outreaching goal is $250,000.

Molt said it comes down to protecting the livelihoods of ranchers dependent on public use permits.

“We will all be extremely affected if the permits are canceled. “Who am I going to sell my bulls or my hay?” Molt said. We have got to look out for our own country, if we don’t no one else will. Rural America is getting choked out. The people who live here, who would like to continue to live here, are the best stewards on the ground. People think we are destroying it. Are we that dumb that we would destroy our own livelihood?”

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — An ex-Marine who was part of the initial convoy that overtook a national wildlife refuge has pleaded guilty.

In federal court in Portland, Jon Ritzheimer admitted to a judge Monday that he conspired with Ammon Bundy and others to prevent Interior Department employees from doing their jobs at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Craig Gabriel said prosecutors will recommend 2 ½ years in prison when the Arizona man is sentenced in May.

Ritzheimer was one of the higher-profile occupiers, known for an emotional video in which he explains to his daughters why he can’t be home for the holidays. He said it was because “daddy swore an oath” to defend the Constitution.

Before coming to Oregon, he made news by organizing protests outside a Phoenix mosque and threatening to arrest a U.S. senator for supporting the Iran nuclear deal.

ROSEBURG, Ore. (AP) — A 10-year-old Roseburg boy has honored the man killed during the 41-day occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge by naming his prize-winning steer after him.

A 1,030-pound black Maine-Anjou named LaVoy Finicum earned third-place at the Douglas County Fair, The News-Review reported. The steer is named after Robert “LaVoy” Finicum, the Arizona rancher killed by law enforcement during the occupation. In March officials declared the shooting justified.

The steer was named by Ryley Schneider, who spent his time at the fair talking to people about Finicum and handing out pocket-sized copies of the U.S. Constitution to police officers.

“LaVoy is a hero who stood up for all of our rights and I believe in him — we all believe in him,” Schneider said. “He stood up for our rights and was just a good man.”

Finicum and more than 20 other people took over the eastern Oregon refuge in January to protest perceived government overreach. The occupiers wanted the federal government to relinquish public lands and free two Oregon ranchers imprisoned for setting fires. Neither demand was met.

Finicum was the only fatality and has since become a sympathetic figure to those who feel the federal government has over-regulated industries.

“When I heard the news (that Finicum died) I didn’t feel happy,” Schneider said. “I felt sad and mad and I didn’t know why it had to happen. He was standing up for everyone’s rights and then he got shot and died. I just didn’t like that.”

Schneider said he hopes to donate some of his prize money to Finicum’s wife.

“She was there and saw her husband get shot,” Schneider said, “So I wanted to give her some money to help.”

Eleven Oregon farms and ranches will receive awards for their historic standing Aug. 27 at the Oregon Century Farm and Ranch Program Awards at the Oregon State Fair.

Six farms from six counties will be honored as Century Farms or ranches, meaning they have been established for at least 100 years.

Five farms from four counties will be honored as Sesquicentennial Farms or ranches, meaning they have been established for at least 150 years.

The Oregon Century Farm and Ranch Program supplied the following information.

The Century Farms are:

• Omeg Family Orchards: August “Gus” Omeg purchased what became Omeg Family Orchards in Wasco County, Ore., in 1905. The farm originally sold cattle, hay, apricots, cherries, peaches and watermelons. The farm later transitioned to large-scale fruit production, specializing in cherries. The main crop today is sweet cherries. Mel Omeg, the founder’s grandson, now owns the orchard. Mel’s son, Michael, manages it.

• Alley Ranch: TW Alley bought 639 acres in Sherman County, Ore., in 1915 after arriving during the early 1900s. Alley’s early crops were wheat, oats, barley, cattle and horses. The farm continued to grow wheat and barley and used conservation practices to keep the land at optimal condition. Dwight Alley, great-grandson of TW Alley, farms the land with several family members.

• Carman Ranch: Jacob Weinhard bought what became Carman Ranch in Wallowa County, Ore., in 1913 when he purchased 2,500 acres. He added 40 acres in 1916. The farm originally sold wheat, barley, oats, alfalfa, cattle and pigs but in the 1970s it transitioned to selling wheat, cattle and hay. The ranch currently raises cattle and pigs and no longer raises wheat. Kent Carman, great-grandson of Jacob Weinhard, runs the ranch with Cory Carman Flynn and Dave Flynn.

• M. Christensen Family Farm: John and Louisa Goffrier purchased 300 acres in August 1900 in Yamhill County, Ore., which became known as the M. Christensen Family Farm. The early crops were grains and grass seed. The farm had horses, dairy cows, pigs and sheep until the 1950s. Lois Mills, granddaughter of the Goffriers, is the current owner with her four children, who each hold small percentages of ownership and are involved in operating the farm.

• Peter Fred Grossen Farm: Peter Fred Grossen founded the Peter Fred Grossen Farm in 1904 when he purchased 72 acres in Washington County, Ore. He cleared the land, planted an apple orchard and established a dairy farm and creamery with Brown Swiss cows. The main crops are now hay, wheat, Brown Swiss Cattle and Swiss cheese. David Grossen, great-great-grandson of Peter Fred Grossen, owns 25 of the original 72 acres, while the remaining members own and operate the balance.

• Alder Glade Farm: John and Mollie Markland founded Alder Glade Farm in 1916 when they purchased 18 acres in Marion County, Ore. The land was a part of the original donation land claim from Thomas L. Coon and it is believed that he and two others are buried on the property. The early crops were sheep, Jersey cattle, chickens and hogs. They also grew hay, grain and corn to feed the livestock. The farm mainly runs a registered flock of Cheviot sheep, Wagyu cattle, hay and other commercial sheep.

The Sesquicentennial Farms are:

• Mosby Century Farm: David Mosby settled his donation land claim of 283 acres in Lane County, Ore., in 1852. The farm has been passed through generations of the family. The early farm grew grain crops, hay and timber and raised hogs that were smoked in the smokehouse and sold in Portland.

Cattle have also been raised on the farm, transitioning from Polled Herefords to Black Angus in the 1990s. Recently, the farm has focused more heavily on cattle, running almost 200 feeders.

• Jesse and Ruby Looney Farm: Jessie and Ruby Looney left Missouri and traveled on the first wagon train to Oregon in 1843 in a move to oppose slavery. They homesteaded land in Marion County, Ore., and secured a provisional land grant in 1846. The farm’s early crops were oats, barley, wheat, produce, beef, dairy cattle and oxen. The homestead was a station for the California Stage Co. route that ran between Portland and San Francisco. The 4-acre farm now raises grass seed, sweet corn, peppermint, broccoli, squash and cauliflower. The farm has been in the Looney family 173 years.

• Maple Hill Farm: Alexander and Christina Esson founded Maple Hill Farm in 1866 in Marion County, Ore. Before them, it was a part of the John and Sarah Carey donation land claim in 1850. The original farm had 320 acres; 290 are still in use today. The farm originally raised wheat, oats, timber, fruit trees, pigs, horses and dairy cattle. Today, grass seed and row crops are the predominant crops grown on the farm.

• Gordon Zimmerman Farm: Alexander Fryer founded the Gordon Zimmerman farm in 1863 in Yamhill County, Ore. The original acreage was more than 500 acres; 83 acres of that is still in use today. Farm ownership was passed down through generations. Oka Fryer married George Zimmerman, and they passed the farm to their son, Gordon Zimmerman.

The original farm had a large prune orchard that was started in the late 1800s. The last orchard was removed in 1950. In the 1950s, Zimmerman and his son-in-law raised grain crops, hairy vetch, field peas and feeder lambs. The current main crop is grass seed. Gordon Dromgoole, the current owner, intends to work with his grandchildren to raise hazelnuts. Gordon Zimmerman still lives on the property in the home that replaced the original house.

• Smith Bros. Farm: John and Sara McCoy came to Oregon in 1845 with their family on a wagon train. The donation land claim was officially recorded in 1853 in Linn County, Ore. Their niece, Irene, married Robert L. Smith and they became owners of the north half, about 305 acres, in 1890. There are still 180 acres in use today. The early crops were wheat, sheep, dairy, hogs, chickens, oats and barley. The current crops are wheat, clover, meadowfoam, fescue and other grasses.

HILLSBORO, Ore. — Three generations of the Grossen family sat around a picnic table on a recent Thursday and talked about their family and their 112-year-old dairy farm.

The Peter Fred Grossen Farm is in Hillsboro, Ore. Peter Fred Grossen founded it in 1904, after he immigrated from Switzerland with his family. More than a century later, his great-great grandson David Grossen and his family will receive a Century Farm Award from the Oregon Century Farm and Ranch Program honoring the farm for its history in Oregon.

The Grossens are one of 11 families being honored for longstanding farms at the Oregon Century Farm and Ranch Program Awards.

Six farms from six counties are being awarded Century status, meaning they have been in continuous operation at least 100 years.

Five farms from four counties are being awarded Sesquicentennial status, meaning they have been in continuous operation at least 150 years.

Andrea Kuenzi, program coordinator, said families must follow a formal application process in which they document the history of the operation of their farm with photos, original deeds, personal stories and other historic records.

David Grossen said researching the history of his family farm was a fun family project.

Grossen’s wife, Jackie, their two children and sister were heavily involved in researching the history of the farm — from when Peter Fred Grossen immigrated to the United States in the 1880s to when their grandfather ran a dairy business to get his family through the Depression to now, with David and his son Hank starting an artisan cheese operation.

The Peter Fred Grossen Farm started as a dairy farm and creamery with Brown Swiss cows. The Grossens also sold wheat, oats, barley, hay and Swiss cheese. The farm’s main crops currently are hay, wheat, Brown Swiss cattle and Swiss cheese.

“The Grossens are very connected to their history and to each other,” Jackie Grossen said.

Other farms being awarded with Century status are: Omeg Family Orchards, Alley Ranch, Carman Ranch, M. Christensen Family Farm and Alder Glade Farm.

Farms being awarded with Sesquicentennial status are: Mosby Century Farm, Jesse & Ruby Looney Farm, Maple Hill Farm, Gordon Zimmerman Farm and Smith Bros. Farm LLC.

The Oregon Century Farm & Ranch Program Awards Program will have an awards ceremony at 11 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 27, at the Oregon State Fair. Award winners receive a certificate signed by Gov. Kate Brown and Katy Coba, director of the Oregon Department of Agriculture. Roadside signs are imprinted with the founder’s name and the year the ranch or farm was established.

“It’s so neat to see the families document their history and the history of Oregon agriculture and make it available to the public,” Kuenzi said.

2016 will be the first year all of the information about the historic farms will be available in PDF form for the public to see. Since 1958, Kuenzi said the records were kept as hard copies at Oregon State University. The Oregon Century Farm and Ranch Awards Program received a grant to digitize all of its records.

For the Grossens, researching their history was a way of growing even closer as a family.

“It was so cool to look through all of the old photos,” said Maria Grossen, David Grossen’s daughter. “I really love learning about our history.”

Oregon Century Farm & Ranch Program

The Oregon Century Farm & Century Ranch Program honors farmers and ranchers who have worked the same land for at least 100 years. The program is administered through the Oregon Farm Bureau Foundation for Education and is partially funded through a partnership of the Oregon Farm Bureau, Wilco, Oregon State Historic Preservation Office and OSU Libraries’ University Archives. Since its start in 1958, 1,175 farms and ranches across the state have been registered.

An Oregon farmer is seeking to recover more than $50,000 in attorney fees from his opponents in a lawsuit over his straw-compressing facility.

Last month, John Gilmour prevailed in the dispute when the Oregon Court of Appeals ruled that straw-compressing operations are allowed outright on land zoned for farming.

Several neighbors and two conservation groups had argued that Gilmour’s straw-compressing facility engaged in crop processing and thus was required to obtain a conditional use permit from the county, which limited his hours of operation.

The appellate court held that such permits aren’t necessary because straw-compressing is a form of crop preparation, not processing, since “straw is unchanged in substance from when it is first baled in the field to when it is packaged for resale.”

Gilmour’s attorney has now filed a petition asking the Oregon Court of Appeals to order his opponents to pay $50,911 because their legal position was “not well-founded in law” and they had “no objectively reasonable basis” for their legal challenge.

He’s also entitled to attorney fees based on Oregon’s “right to farm” law, which prohibits nuisance and trespass lawsuits against common farming practices, the petition said.

“Petitioners brought this appeal in an attempt to harass and delay a working farmer who has neither the time nor resources to defend such a frivolous claim,” the petition said.

The neighbors and conservation groups were motivated by “substantial animus” toward Gilmour’s farming operation and the associated “truck traffic, noise, and straw debris.”

Suzi Maresh, a neighbor who opposed the facility because she believes it causes traffic hazards, said she was taken aback by the request for attorney fees.

The lawsuit concerned the interpretation of state land use laws, not nuisance and trespass claims over common farming practices, she said.

“We were certainly surprised because we were under the impression that would not be the case,” Maresh said.

The $50,911 in attorney fees would impose a steep financial burden, she said. “We can’t afford that kind of money.”

George Francis Horning, 92, passed away on Aug. 9, 2016, at home, the family farm he and his brother Ivan started over 70 years ago.

He was a farmer, a World War II veteran, a devoted husband and beloved father and grandfather.

George Francis Horning was born March 26, 1924, to George Edwin Horning and Nancy Rose Horning in Corvallis, Ore., and grew up on the family farm.

George was the eldest and surviving twin of seven siblings: Ivan (Pat), Julian (Noreen), Viola (Clarence Morrison), Nancy Ann (Harold Howard), Betty (Lehrl Conn) and Sandy (Herb Hull).

He attended Eureka grade school and graduated from Monroe High School in May 1941. He went to work on a turkey ranch in Irish Bend until the bombing of Pearl Harbor, when he worked at Camp Adair as a carpenter apprentice.

Enlisting in the U.S. Navy in September 1942, he trained in San Diego on torpedoes and received an award for expert rifle and pistol marksmanship. He was stationed in Papua, New Guinea, and was cut by shrapnel when the USS Mt. Hood exploded in November 1944 near Manus Island while he was on deck of another ship in the blast zone.

When the war ended, he had earned the rank of Specialist Second Class. George retired from the U.S. Navy Reserve in April 1984 with the rank of First Class Petty Officer.

George’s military service was a source of great pride, and in October 2014, he made an Honor Flight to Washington, D.C.

On a weekend leave in December 1944, he married his high school sweetheart, Eleanor Loretta Bailey, with whom he accumulated over 500 pages of wartime correspondence and 71 years of rich memories.

They raised six children on their farm and dairy.

Even after closing the dairy in 1985, George always kept a few cows. As a boy, George had loved working with the horses that pulled the farm implements, and after the war in 1946, he and Ivan bought 30 acres from their father and started farming.

Over the years they grew sweet corn, table beets, peppermint, wheat, squash, field corn and beans. In the early years of growing pole beans, George bought some retired school buses and had a route to pick up the bean pickers and hoeing crews every morning, employing many young people and creating great memories.

He was generous with his time and had a long record of community service and civic-mindedness, serving on the board of directors of many organizations: Eureka and Irish Bend grade schools, 20 years on the Monroe High School Board, the Agri-Pac Board of Directors, the Benton County Draft Board, as well as 35 years on the Consumers Power Board, 17 of them as chairman.

George enjoyed organizing community events such as pet parades, talent shows and movie nights at the Monroe Methodist Church, where he and Eleanor were lifelong members.

He was also active with the Monroe Cemetery Association and the VFW.

In short, he loved bringing people together and organized many family gatherings and reunions over the years. Even George and Eleanor’s greatest vacation was a 9-day community rafting trip floating the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon.

George is preceded in death by his wife, Eleanor; children George Clifford (Kathleen) and Loretta Susan; two grandchildren, Lydia Marie Horning and Zachary Cook; and brothers Ivan and Julian.

He wrote that the “greatest reward” of his life is “my family,” and he leaves behind a loving clan who will miss him dearly: his children, Kathy Freeman (Paul Kafoury), Diana Gamache (Bill), Eric (Christine), and David (Dan Ogle); 14 grandchildren, George Earl, Ted, Lance, Susan, Kenneth, Terri, Kimberly, Jennifer, Errin, Nathan, Nicholas, Connor, Reid and Montessa; 27 great-grandchildren, and nine great-great grandchildren.

A funeral service is planned for 2 p.m., Sunday, Aug. 14, at the Monroe High School gymnasium, followed by a graveside service at Monroe Cemetery. There will be a dessert social in the high school commons following the graveside service.

Memorial contributions may be made to South Benton Historical Association of Monroe, the Monroe Cemetery Association, or a charity of choice in care of McHenry Funeral Home, 206 NW Fifth St., Corvallis, OR 97330.

ONTARIO, Ore. — Onion growers in Eastern Oregon and southwestern Idaho are dealing with a new plant disease that can damage the inside of onions but they so far don’t know what’s causing it or how to prevent it.

Oregon State University researchers are conducting field trials to try to answer those questions.

“We know what the problem is real well but we don’t know what’s causing it or how to manage it,” said Clint Shock, director of OSU’s Malheur County experiment station.

The disease is caused by a plant pathogen known as fusarium proliferatum and can damage the inside of the onion. An affected onion looks fine on the outside but is not desirable to consumers when it’s cut open.

That particular type of fusarium fungi has caused a few cases of so-called onion bulb rot over the years but it became a major issue in 2014 and 2015, said OSU Cropping Systems Extension Agent Stuart Reitz.

“Over the past couple of years we’ve seen it become a real serious problem,” he said. “We’re trying to figure out, is there some trigger that makes onions susceptible to getting the disease.”

One theory that is being explored in the Malheur County field trial is that high temperatures cause a condition known as dry scale, which is when the top of the onion doesn’t completely close, leaving a small opening where the fungal pathogen can enter.

The 2014 and 2015 summers in this region had unusually high temperatures and the OSU field trial includes heat strips that make the soil around the onion bulb hotter.

“By sampling onions every week, we’re trying to understand when the defects start to show up ... and see if temperature is a factor,” Shock said. “If temperature is a factor, there are various approaches we can take to try to reduce the bulb temperature.”

A separate trial is exploring the effectiveness of different fungicides that have proven beneficial in treating related fusarium pathogens that impact other crops.

Reitz is also collecting samples from various farms around the region “and looking at different varieties and growing conditions, trying to track when we see the problem coming on so growers can use fungicides at the right time instead of having to spray all year long.”

Bob Simerly, an agronomist with McCain Foods, a large processor of onions grown in this region, is skeptical that heat is causing the problem. High temperatures and dry scale have been around for a long time but the disease hasn’t, he said.

He thinks it could be linked with a significant increase in corn acreage in the region. Corn is a host for many different fusarium fungi, including the one that causes onion rot, he said.

“My theory is that the increase in corn acres ... has increased the amount of spores of this (pathogen) in the environment,” he said.

Paul Skeen, president of the Malheur County Onion Growers Association, said there are many different opinions on what’s causing the disease but as of now, “I don’t think anybody really knows.”

For the second year in a row, grower Charlie Ruddell of Bandon, Ore., is claiming the earliest delivery of cranberries in North America.

Ruddell planned to deliver the first of 2016’s harvest on Aug. 11 to the Ocean Spray co-op receiving station on the Oregon Coast. That’s eight days earlier than 2015, which itself was about two weeks earlier than normal.

Ocean Spray spokeswoman Kellyanne Dignan confirmed Ruddell is the co-op’s first delivery and said she is confident he’s the earliest in North America as well.

“Mother Nature’s the boss” on harvest timing, she said.

An unusually warm growing season in 2015 made many crops ready for harvest earlier than normal. Ruddell, of Randolph Cranberries Inc., said other factors are at play this year.

The variety he’s growing, Demoranville, blooms earlier and matures faster than other commercial varieties, Ruddell said.

Secondly, Ocean Spray is paying growers a bonus of $2.50 per 100-pound barrel for cranberries that are lighter color than in years past. Another $2 per barrel bonus is available for cranberries delivered by Sept. 19. If a cranberry bog produces 250 barrels, that amounts to a $1,125 bonus.

“It sets well with me,” Ruddell said.

Dignan, the Ocean Spray spokeswoman, said the co-op’s desired color standard has changed over time. Cranberries traditionally were made into juice or sauce, which requires a darker berry. But now most cranberries are dried and sweetened to make “craisins,” and a lighter-colored, earlier berry is preferable, she said.

Wisconsin and Massachusetts rank first and second in U.S. cranberry production. New Jersey is third, and Oregon and Washington are fourth and fifth, respectively. The U.S. usually produces between 8 million and 9 million barrels annually. The Oregon crop is valued at about $12 million per year.

Dignan said Ocean Spray will release updated 2016 crop projections soon. Ruddell said his 2015 crop was down 5 or 6 percent from 2014, but might bounce back this year. “My intuition is that we will have a pretty strong year,” he said.

KLAMATH FALLS, Ore. — Both sides in the debate over removing four dams from the Klamath River are keeping the pressure on as the project moves forward.

The Hoopa Valley Tribe is suing federal agencies to improve flows in the lower Klamath River for endangered coho salmon — a goal that proponents say could be achieved if the dams came out.

Tribal chairman Ryan Jackson said disease rates in juvenile salmon in the past two years have soared well beyond limits established in a 2013 biological opinion from the National Marine Fisheries Service, and that even those limits don’t meet standards set in tribal trusts.

“It’s not so much to do with dam removal per se, although certainly that’s a part of it,” Jackson said of the tribe’s goals behind the lawsuit. “The lawsuit really gets down to the protection of the fishery and the needs for increased flows and enhanced water quality.”

The lawsuit follows the Karuk Tribe’s filing in late June of a 60-day notice of intent to sue the NMFS and Bureau of Reclamation over alleged violations of the Endangered Species Act. The tribe cites a disease infection rate of 90 percent of sampled juvenile salmon in 2015.

The tribes assert that low water levels in the lower Klamath River are too warm for fish and are polluted with nutrients and chemicals. The legal actions lend a sense of urgency as the Karuks and others are engaged in water-sharing negotiations with federal agencies and upper Klamath Basin irrigators.

“We’re trying to figure out how we can add a disease-management flow event,” said Craig Tucker, the Karuk Tribe’s natural resources policy advocate. “We think that dam removal will alleviate the problem, but we need something between now and dam removal. We can’t just allow 90 percent of juvenile salmon in the river to succumb to these diseases.”

Shane Hunt, a Reclamation spokesman in Sacramento, said the bureau doesn’t comment on pending litigation.

The filings come as dam-removal plans agreed on earlier this year are moving forward. The newly formed Klamath River Renewal Corporation, a non-government body taking over the dams from owner PacifiCorp, will likely file for removal with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission before the end of August, said Nancy Vogel, a California Natural Resources Agency spokeswoman.

Top state and federal officials signed an agreement in April to have the nonprofit organization go through FERC to remove the dams after legislation authorizing their removal failed to make it through Congress by the end of 2015. Proponents are still seeking federal legislation that would provide money to operate two diversion dams within the basin that PacifiCorp would turn over to Reclamation so irrigators wouldn’t have to pick up the cost.

Political opposition to dam removal remains vocal in the basin, including from Lawrence Kogan, a former Klamath Irrigation District attorney who’s now working through his own nonprofit advocacy organization to raise questions about the project.

The KID’s newly elected majority hired Kogan earlier this year to scrutinize the dam-removal process but cut ties with him in mid-July when some board members thought the New York-based attorney had overstepped his contract, the Klamath Falls Herald and News reported. Acting district manager Darin Kandra did not return calls from the Capital Press seeking comment.

Kogan has since sent public-records requests to the Bureau of Reclamation and five state agencies seeking the details of behind-the-scenes discussions of the amended dam-removal and water-sharing agreements, including how needed irrigation canal improvements would be funded.

“These are things that are public information,” said Kogan, adding that “half of the basin doesn’t know what’s going on and has been kept in the dark” because of non-disclosure agreements among the agencies.

Ed Sheets, who facilitates a committee implementing the Klamath agreements, said all of the bargained-for benefits in the pacts “were clearly spelled out” for those in the basin that would be affected.

“On a larger scale, there’s been some conversations between the tribes and irrigators to see if some of the things (in the original Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement) can be put back together,” Sheets said. “That’s going to be a complicated process.”

Cattle and calves, followed by greenhouse and nursery plants, again paced Oregon crop values in 2015, the state ag department reported.

Preliminary figures assembled by USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service show the state with a crop value of $5.4 billion in 2015, similar to the previous two years, Oregon Department of Agriculture spokesman Bruce Pokarney said in a news release.

The statistics showed sharp drops in some crop values due to market conditions. Hay and milk values dropped by $100 million and $180 million, respectively, compared to 2014, but are still much higher than 10 years ago.

The greenhouse and nursery sector, which by itself was valued at $1 billion in 2007 before the recession hit, continues its gradual recovery. The industry hit a low of $667 million in 2010, but stood at $894 million in 2015. Grass seed, which is also tightly tied to housing and development and sank during the recession, is back to the value it achieved in 2005.

Oregon’s wine grape sector has shown “easily the most astonishing growth” over the past 10 years, according to the department. Production value was at $36 million in 2005, but has grown by 308 percent since then and in 2015 was estimated at $147 million. “No other Oregon agricultural commodity has seen a higher increase,” ODA reported.

Oregon Wine Board spokeswoman Michelle Kaufmann said the number of wineries in Oregon has increased 45 percent since 2011.

Here’s the state’s top 10:

1. Cattle and calves, $914 million

2. Greenhouse and nursery products, $894 million

3. Hay, $604 million

4. Milk, $474 million

5. Grass seed, $383 million

6. Wheat, $217 million

7. Potatoes, $176 million

8. Pears, $152 million

9. Wine grapes, $147 million

10. Onions, $125 million

ONTARIO, Ore. — There could be as much as 160,000 acre-feet of carryover water left in the Owyhee Reservoir when the 2016 irrigation season ends.

That’s less carryover water than would be expected during an average year but, due to extended drought conditions that broke this winter, much more than the reservoir has ended the irrigation season with since 2012.

The reservoir provides water to 118,000 acres of irrigated farmland in Eastern Oregon and part of southwestern Idaho.

“It feels a lot better,” than the last several years, Owyhee Irrigation District Manager Jay Chamberlin said about the 2016 water year. “I think overall it’s going to be a good season.”

In an average water year, the Owyhee system will end the season with about 350,000 to 400,000 acre-feet of water that farmers can bank on for the next year. During good water years, that number is as much as 500,000 acre-feet.

The reservoir can hold a maximum of 710,000 acre-feet of storage water for irrigators.

As of Aug. 9, there was 277,000 ace-feet of storage water left in the reservoir and about 3,000 acre-feet has been leaving the system each day.

Chamberlin said that based on current trends, there should be more than 100,000 acre-feet left at the end of the season.

“(That’s) still a long way from normal, but when you’ve come off those really, really tough years that we’ve had, that gives you a lot more hope heading into next year,” he said. “We’re going to be in a lot better shape than we’ve been in.”

OID board member and farmer Bruce Corn estimates there will be between 120,000 and 160,000 acre-feet of carryover water left.

OID patrons get 4 acre-feet of water during a normal water year, like 2016, but only received a third of that amount in 2014 and 2015.

If there is around 150,000 feet of carryover water this year, growers would have a lot more breathing room heading into next year than they have enjoyed the past two years, when the reservoir finished the season with about 5,000 acre-feet of carryover water.

“It gives you a little bit of a cushion” heading into 2017, Corn said. “Exactly how much carryover water we will end up with remains to be seen. But certainly we should be over 100,000 acre-feet.”

Corn and Chamberlin said it’s likely that irrigation water will be shut off about the first of October, a couple weeks earlier than normal, in an effort to ensure as much carryover water as possible.

The OID board will probably decide on a firm shutoff date during its Aug. 23 meeting, Corn said.

Most of the area’s high-water crops are about two weeks ahead of normal, Corn said, which means September irrigation usage should be way down.

“I’d be surprised if we go past that” early October date, Chamberlin said. “Our crops are coming off early (and) I think that will help and nobody hopefully will come up short on water.”

Capital Press

A state economist says five of Oregon’s nine regional economies, paced by Portland, have regained all the jobs lost in the recession and are all-time highs in terms of employment.

Two other regions are nearly at that level, but rural southeast and southwest Oregon “still have a long way to go,” economist Josh Lehner reported in his most recent blog post.

Lehner said the regional economies of the Portland area, Columbia River Gorge, Northeast Oregon, the Willamette Valley and Central Oregon have regained all their recessionary job losses. The North Coast and Rogue Valley areas may reach that point in the next couple months, he said.

In addition to reporting the number of jobs, Lehner said the state Office of Economic Analysis also studies the so-called “jobs gap.”

“This looks at employment relative to the size of population that would likely be working or looking for work if the economy was firing on all cylinders or at full capacity,” he wrote. “The key technical point here is that it adjusts for the aging Baby Boomers as they are entering into retirement in greater numbers these days.”

By that measure, the state in July finally added enough jobs to catch back up with population growth since the onset of the recession, Lehner said. The jobs gap remains largest in rural Oregon, particularly the southern counties, he said.

“Growth has returned, these regional economies are on the mend, but further progress is still needed,” Lehner concluded.